Douglas Elliman focuses on drawing more wealthy buyers to SoFla

Douglas Elliman is bringing its top 100 top-producing agents to Miami next week for a retreat on how to draw more wealthy buyers from Greater New York and overseas to South Florida, the company told The Real Deal today.

Dottie Herman

“A large portion will be devoted to educating our agents and managers from across the company about our spectacular new developments in South Florida, so they can provide the best insights to their clients,” Dottie Herman, Douglas Elliman’s president and chief executive, said in an email.

The four-day retreat, which begins Sunday at the Ritz Carlton Key Biscayne, will be packed with field trips to new developments and the brokerage’s top exclusive listings across South Florida. The agents represent clients in both South Florida and New York, including New York City, Long Island, Westchester County and the Hamptons.

“A lot of the buyers we’re seeing in South Florida right now, especially in these new developments, are from the New York metropolitan area,” Vanessa Grout, Douglas Elliman’s Florida chief executive, said in a news release.

Quarterly reports for Miami are available in Spanish and Portuguese.

The tours will include Ian Schrager’s The Residences at the Miami Beach Edition, where two adjacent penthouses sold for $34 million earlier this year, setting a record for the region’s most expensive condo transaction; Faena House, where Elliman hopes to shatter records with a $50 million penthouse; and Palau Sunset Harbour, a 45-unit complex that is 100 percent reserved pre-construction.

Herman also announced that Douglas Elliman will continue its push to bring more foreign investors to South Florida by rolling out a new global campaign this fall with international affiliate Knight Frank residential. On its website, the property consultancy lists homes in Botswana, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Bahrain, Qatar, Hong Kong, South Korea, Vietnam and across Europe. –Emily Schmall